Assembling Pieces of Accountability for the Srebrenica Genocide

The Srebrenica genocide has been the subject of multiple legal proceedings against various actors before different courts, at both the national and international level. Amongst others, the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia has sentenced various individual perpetrators, the International Court of Justice has ruled on the responsibility of the Serbian state, and Dutch courts have been asked to rule on the liability of the Dutch state and the United Nations. This raises the following question: to what extent have multiple adjudicatory mechanisms across legal regimes managed to deliver accountability for the Srebrenica genocide and what are the remaining accountability gaps? In order to answer this question, the article focuses on both legal procedural accountability and substantive accountability. It first recalls the events of July 1995, including the different actors involved (both through their actions and omissions), before giving an overview of cases that have been litigated under criminal law, tort law, and international state responsibility law in multiple international, regional and domestic jurisdictions. The analysis concludes with an overarching analysis of the extent to which legal accountability for the Srebrenica genocide has been achieved.